RotoWire News: Bauer tweaked his slider during the offseason in an attempt to mimic the movement of teammate Corey Kluber's slurve and Toronto's Marcus Stroman's curveball, Zack Meisel of The Athletic Cleveland reports. (3/5/2018)

Profile: Profile:Bauer, a mechanical engineering and mathematics major at UCLA, is as talented as he is smart. During his tenure in Arizona, Bauer's insistence that we would not alter his training methods was perceived as stubbornness. Whether he was right or not, Arizona's search for "gritty" team players begot Bauer's departure. In Cleveland, Bauer will start fresh and should compete for a place in the Indians' rotation. On stuff alone - Bauer features a to mid 90s fastball and a nasty curveball - winning a job shouldn't be an issue.(JD Sussman)

The Quick Opinion: The Diamondbacks sold low of the former Golden Spikes winner after he fell out of favor with organization. If Cleveland allows Bauer to continue his epic training regimen he has the talent to lay waste to the AL Central. (JD Sussman)

Profile: If Trevor Bauer's 2013 season turns out to be representative of his future, the Diamondbacks are going to look awfully smart for shipping him off. Forget the ugly numbers in Cleveland. Ignore the 5.29 ERA which was somehow lower than his FIP (7.05) or that he somehow posted a walk rate that was higher than either (8.47 per nine -- seriously, in 17 innings he walked 16). Instead, look at his numbers in Columbus -- the 4.15 ERA is not terrible (although not particularly prospect-y) but the 5.08 FIP isn't pretty and his walk rate was AGAIN higher than either other number (5.41). Gone, too, were the prolific strikeout numbers from earlier in his career. If you want to be optimistic though, you just have to look past the numbers. Bauer, despite a reputation for rejecting coaching, spent much of the 2013 season reworking his delivery and has been in constant contact with Indians staff this off-season. They might be biased, having shipped off a newly-minted $130MM man to get Bauer, but the Indians are encouraged and there are reports that he is again showing the electricity that made him one of baseball's top prospects. I imagine Bauer will start 2014 in Triple-A, but in deep leagues or leagues with minor league spots, he is worth a flyer. He may not recapture past glory, but if he does, you'll want to be along for the ride. (Chad Young)

The Quick Opinion: Statistically, 2013 was an unmitigated disaster for Bauer. But he is working on a new approach, taking to coaching, and the reports in the off-season are encouraging. Don't count on anything, but don't forget that this was one of the most highly touted arms in all of baseball.

Profile: Here on FanGraphs, we love the projection systems. There's no better way to project future performance, and so we use them often. But they're not always perfect, and they're not meant to be taken as gospel. The systems miss badly on some players, and some guys are just hard to project. Trevor Bauer is one of those guys where I will be ignoring the projections. By Steamer, Bauer is projected to be essentially replacement-level in 2015 after a solid first full year in 2014. It's likely because his first eight starts went as terrible as humanly possible. Bauer walked almost everybody, and the ones he didn't walk took him deep. These impossibly bad results lead to a nasty projection, but what the projections don't know is that Bauer was a top prospect, that he studies the science of pitching perhaps more than any player in the league, and that he completely re-worked his mechanics, which are now much more efficient and allow him to increase his velocity even after 100 pitches. Sure, Bauer has his warts. The walk rate is still ugly and he seems to have a penchant for hard contact. But the strikeout rate is also still lower than people expected and he's still just 24 years old. (August Fagerstrom)

The Quick Opinion: Don't put too much stock in the projections for Trevor Bauer's 2015. Instead, make your own. Everybody's got their own opinion on Bauer -- he's a divisive player. But legitimate improvements to his mechanics in 2014 lead me to believe it's just as likely he improves upon his 2014 numbers, rather than regress.

Profile: I would love to give you a solid opinion on Trevor Bauer, but I am not sure I have one. Is he a bust? His final 2015 numbers might leave you feeling that way. 4.55 ERA, 4.33 FIP, 4.0 walks and 1.2 homers per game, neither of which can be sustained without an elite strikeout rate which he does not have (8.7 strikeouts per nine). Or is he an elite prospect with some post-hype sleeper potential? If you cherry pick a bit: in April, May and September, he threw 83 innings (almost half his season) with 83 strikeouts and 37 walks (9 K/9, 4.01 BB/9), but controlled the long ball (.53 HR/9) leading to a 3.80 ERA and an even better FIP. The difference? His home run per fly ball rate. When he avoids the long ball, he pitches well enough. How about another cut -- he had 16 starts (out of 30) with 5+ innings pitched and three or fewer walks. He still gave up too many home runs (1.2 HR/9) in those starts, but his ERA was 2.85. So if he avoids the free pass, he pitches extremely well. There is still hope for Bauer. If he can limit the walks, even with the home runs, he'll be very good. If he can limit BOTH, he can still be elite. I wouldn't bet heavily on either, but he's worth a flyer in deeper formats and worth tracking in all leagues. (Chad Young)

The Quick Opinion: When Bauer walks people, he pitches poorly. When he doesn't, he doesn't pitch poorly. If he finds the control, he can be a fantasy diamond in the rough, just don't pay too high a price to find out.

Profile: Trevor Bauer has always been a bit of an enigma, and 2016 perfectly captured that idea. After starting the season in the bullpen, Bauer somehow still managed to start 28 games and become a critical rotation piece for an Indians team that went all the way to Game 7 of the World Series. Bauer’s numbers this season were good but not great. He struck out 8.0 and walked 3.3 batters per nine, which produced a 4.26 ERA that was just a bit higher than his 4.13 xFIP. Those numbers, and in particular Bauer’s improved command, make him worthy of at least spot-starting even in shallow fantasy formats—although, take note that Bauer’s 3.67 ERA on the road was more than a run better than it was at home in 2016. But even with the improvements, it’s hard to escape the idea that Bauer’s career has been a bit of a disappointment. Originally the No. 3 overall pick in the 2011 draft, Bauer continues to flash elite stuff, which Eno Sarris compared favorably to what Jake Arrieta throws. Perhaps because of inconsistent command or a lack of deception, Bauer’s results have never quite lived up to what the quality of his pitches suggests they should be. But given Bauer’s track record of confounding, it’s probably dangerous to assume that he can’t transform himself again. (Scott Spratt)

The Quick Opinion: Trevor Bauer had a wild ride in 2016, starting the year in the bullpen and ending it as the Indians’ Game 2 and Game 5 starter in the World Series. As that trajectory would suggest, Bauer shows major improvements in 2016, in particular with his command. Still, his actual results never quite have lived up to the quality of his stuff.

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